My Chair

While at a dinner party just this past winter I asked the woman next to me, an employee of Scholastic Books, what she felt her company's best picture book of 2004 was. Without hesitation the woman said that it was, "My Chair", by Betsy James. I found myself a little ashamed to admit that I hadn't heard of this title before. On hearing me say this, the woman nodded her head a little sadly but reiterated that the book, in her eyes, was a wonderful creation and deserved more attention than it had received. Intrigued, I sought out "My Chair" and read it for myself. However, being (at my core) a lazy lazy person, I neglected to write a review of it until now. Certainly "My Chair" will have its fans, and it is undoubtedly a pleasant little book, but whether or not it deserves the lack of attention it has received is not for me to say. In a city park, children gather together with various things on which to sit. Each kid talks about their "chair". A boy in a tire swing says that his works, "because I bend in the middle". A girl on a big comfy sofa says with glee, "My chair is squishy. It eats people". A boy in a wheelchair proclaims proudly, "mine's more like a horse or a train. It's not quite legs, and not quite wings...It's like glasses - I put it on in the morning". Slowly, more and more children gather, stretching their imaginations hither and thither. At one point, complete and utter bedlam breaks out and an image of a boy in a corner accompanies the text, "In my chair I consider what's fair". Finally, by the end of the book the kids see the person they've all been gathering for. A new baby arrives to meet them, and her present is a bouncy chair, all her own. The final parting shot shows everyone still in the park, only now it is nighttime and people are either reading books or discussing the new child. It's a sweet subject and a sweet book, but not a particularly satisfying creation. Kids reading through, "My Chair", will certainly enjoy catching all the little details that appear from page to page. When one girl mentions that other animals never use chairs, the kids around her pretend to be a variety of different creatures. I was a little disturbed by the fact that though characters speak all the time, nobody ever opens their mouth when talking. This isn't because their monologues are silent. As pointed out earlier, kids react to what their friends say. It's simply a somewhat bizarre choice on the part of illustrator Mary Newell DePalma. When it all comes down to it, however, "My Chair" can make for an enchanting read. Maybe there were elements to it I would've changed. Maybe the pairing of author and illustrator is not as seamless here as in comparable picture books out there. But there's a real sense of community and friendship in this book that's difficult to dismiss. Though I was not as taken with it as I would have liked, it still makes for an interesting read. Recommended with some slight reservations.